GOP senators seek Obamacare’s repeal, and offer an alternative

By Russ Britt

Despite more than three dozen failed efforts to repeal Obamacare in the House, a trio of Republican Senators is going to give it at least one more try by forwarding their own alternative to the Affordable Care Act.

Bloomberg

Sens. Orrin Hatch of Utah, Richard Burr of North Carolina and Tom Coburn from Oklahoma, are pushing non-mandated health care coverage, but still would require insurers to offer coverage. The group’s proposal – dubbed the Patient Choice, Affordability, Responsibility and Empowerment, or CARE, Act — would expand the maximum premium ratio between the healthiest consumers and the sickest would be 5-to-1, wider than Obamacare’s 3-to-1 ratio. Individual states, however, could loosen or tighten the ratio on their own if they passed their own laws.

Insurers would be prohibited from dropping individuals purely because of health status. Further, any consumer who has received “continuous coverage” from any insurer for at least the past 18 months could not be denied a health policy from other insurers if they switch plans and wouldn’t be forced to pay higher premiums. But there is no mention of simply denying coverage if an individual has had none. And presumably, the higher pricing ratio would help insurers cover costs.

“The American people have found out what is in Obamacare — broken promises in the form of increased health care costs, costly mandates, and government bureaucracy. They don’t like it and don’t want to keep it,” Burr said in a prepared statement. “Our nation’s health care system was unsustainable before Obamacare, and the president’s health care plan made things worse.”

Other changes the legislation proposes include offering tax breaks on health policies for those making up to 300% of the federal poverty level, or $34,470 as of 2013, instead of Obamacare’s 400% level. It also would put caps on Medicaid, limit medical malpractice lawsuits and would cap the tax breaks that employers get for offering coverage to bring them in line with individuals who pay for their own insurance.

The senators say the proposal is designed to limit the costs that Obamacare imposes in higher out-of-pocket costs on premiums and deductibles, as well as eliminate mandates that they claim are driving up the price of health care.

Officials from the White House and the industry trade group America’s Health Insurance Plans had no immediate comment. But it’s unlikely the proposal would make it out of the Senate, and even less likely President Obama would sign it.

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